Sweden's Victory Challenge beat Le Defi Areva of France in the first race of their best-of-seven Louis Vuitton challenger quarter final series on the Hauraki gulf this afternoon.
In the most comprehensive win of the day, Victory Challenge beat the French yacht by two minutes and 3 seconds.
Philippe Presti, back atthe helm of the yellow FRA-69 in a southerly wind of 14-18 knots, had a close pre-start battle against the Swedes and crossed the line one second ahead.
Jesper Bank at the helm of Orm SWE-73 worked hard to protect the right hand side and started to windward of Le Defi, close to the committee boat and quickly got into their stride to capture the lead.
The French boat fought a close fight all the way up the first beat with very similar boatspeed to Orm for the first half of the beat.
The Swedes only pulled out a definite lead after Le Defi opted to do a double tack near the windward mark, allowing Orm to lead by 23 seconds around the first mark.
Thereafter the Victory Challenge boat extended all the way down the run and by the leeward mark had built up an unassailable lead.
